Our 16 year-old Laurel kidnaped me from the daily doldrums of recovery during a pandemic where I have too much time to think.
Throwing the car into park at 35 miles per hour, she leaps from an open door as in slow motion, long blond hair blowing in the wind crowing the perfection of a teenager who knows what she wants.
"I'll be right back," she calls rushing inside, as I slowly make my way towards her still moving vehicle.
Laurel returns holding a bag of quarters just as I arrive at the now idling car.
"Hold these," she grins, dropping the bag in my lap as we speed downtown.
Laurel has no idea where anything is so she relies on GPS for everything! Even when I suggest a much shorter route, she laughs, "You have no idea where we're going!"
"I think I do," I grin and it turns out I'm right.
Bobbie's is a 50's style dinner in Savannah, where each table has it's own juke box, hence the quarters. Laurel's grandfather had taken her and she thought I'd love it so she hatched the plan to kidnap me from cancer.
We have a blast munching on burgers, fries and cokes, enjoying the freedom of being out.
"Is something making you uncomfortable?" she fires, suddenly dead serious, eyes intensely focused on me.
"Yeah," I say shifting in the booth bench, "you know 'cancer butt' and all?"
She laughs, but it takes a moment for the caregiver in her to calm down again.
Afterwards she drives me passed her job at St. John's Episcopal Church, around curvy Bonaventure to the islands, where the closer we get to home the faster we talk, trying to squeeze more in, leaving me both exhilarated and exhausted.
I spend lots of time thinking about things because, well, Sarah and I have lots to think about these days, mostly unbearably bad subjects, each one carrying the weight of the world.
Laurel sees and feels it as her mother and I try to prop each other up and her response is completely grounded in youthful determination and joy. These are the absolute best of days and, if we're too preoccupied to notice, then Laurel forces us to ignore anything unpleasant and have a good time!
Somewhere beneath our mountain of isolated healing from a seemingly unending regiment of procedures, most minor but some life altering, not just for me but Sarah too, Laurel wakes up the 16 year old still alive deep down inside.
She makes our world lighter and heavy things are shoved aside for a little while, because she's smart enough to recognize when somebody's in desperate need of kidnapping.
For days now the 16 year old me has been bragging about how great his life was then to every other version of who I've been, but as good as it was, and believe me it was incredible, it's so much better now!
I'm married to a crazy Gypsy wonder of a woman who loves me enough to purposely hold my hand as we stroll through the valley of the shadow of death while making plans to expatriate to Central America to raise our love child.
Laurel and her sisters watch, challenge and offer encouragement, as we cheer on the launch of their own journeys into the lives they're making.
There's an eery lightness to my life, a series of graceful moments delivered in the nick of time, diverting the unbearable burdens of cancer so Sarah and I can catch our breaths before resuming focus on the monotonous demands of unanswerable questions.
Back on the porch, I watch the puff of white smoke dissipate against a deep blue, cloudless sky.
It's the living I'm focused on as Laurel's bringing her boyfriend Cooper over for dinner and that's always a ton of fun.
Life's depressing enough during a pandemic but as my wife says, "we have not found our after-cancer--diagnosis - Whipple survivor - now-living-with-cancer, new normal yet" so we're forever grateful for any outrageous tangible expression of the best people have to offer.
Life is indeed hard these days but every single one has an episode of crazy fun that keeps us hanging on when there's every reason in the world to stop.
Who's got time to stop when life is still fun?
Is this what a "brave battle against cancer" looks like, the grasping hold of moments of joy in spite of undeniable weariness?
I don't know.
It's not something I think about as I flick the Bic lighter and proceed to blow prayers of Thanksgiving to God for how blessed I am.
